For the love of wine

We kept the food at our recent Stomping Girl barrel tasting event super simple and Pinot Noir-friendly. We didn’t want to overpower the wine but did want to serve something–seems prudent to offer a bite to eat when people are drinking wine, even if it is small pours.  I served two spreads–my favorite go-to blue cheese spread and a new smoked salmon spread recipe–and water crackers.  They are both very simple, tasty and can be prepared ahead of time.

My blue cheese spread is, roughly:

• 2 oz. Pt. Reyes Original Blue Cheese (or other quality blue cheese)
• 6 oz. cream cheese, softened
• 2 oz. butter, softened
• handful chopped walnuts

Mix together cheeses and butter with hand mixer.  Toast walnuts in dry skillet over medium heat.  Stir cooled nuts into cheese mixture.  Transfer to small serving bowl.  Sprinkle a few walnuts on top and serve with crackers or sliced baguette.  Yum!  Many people have told me that although they are not blue cheese fans, they like this spread.  I myself can devour a crock of this mildly flavored spread in no time.

The smoked salmon spread was an Ina Garten recipe from Food Network.  I left out the horseradish–too strong for Pinot Noir–and slightly reduced the amount of sour cream.  The fresh dill was a nice touch and was not too much for the wine.

So next time you need a quick appetizer to impress your friends with, whip together one of these spreads (I recommend the blue cheese) and pop open a bottle of Stomping Girl Pinot Noir.  If you can’t wait until January 2010, our release date, I suppose another bottle of Pinot would work, too.  Cheers!

Stomping Girl Wines is happy to announce the addition of another stellar vineyard to our 2009 lineup, Corona Creek Vineyard in the Sonoma Coast appellation.

Corona Creek is situated in the area known as the Petaluma Gap. Vineyards in the Petaluma Gap benefits from the cooling effect of the morning fog, coming in from the Pacific ocean. The cool fog moderates the area’s temperature and prolongs the growing season, giving the grapes time to slowly reach full physiological maturity and develop robust complex flavors.

Corona Creek vineyard owners, Janet Seddon and Chris Ritcey have a unique vineyard and  one which we are very lucky to secure fruit from.  Their vineyard is only one part of their 20 acre farm, actually a very diverse farm where they grow olive trees, fruit and vegetables renowned for their high quality in the Sonoma area. I heard the tomatoes are especially prized and I can’t wait to try some.

They take a holistic approach to farming, which we appreciate. In the addition to the Owl boxes for gopher management, they have sheep for the purposes of weed control, the sheep are miniature and can’t reach the ‘yummy’ grapes above them. And of course, while the sheep are at it, they help fertilize the soil!  Cover crop between the rows provide for a natural way to introduce nitrogen to the vineyard.  Read more about Corona Creek  farming practices here.

Bees were buzzing by on one of my visits and Chris noted that they go from the cover crop in between the vine rows on to pollinating his Pluot orchard.  A complete farm.  I can’t wait to make wine out of Corona Creek’s grapes, from the Hillside Block.

Stomping Girl Wines had a great turn out for our first barrel tasting event featuring our ‘08 Pinot Noirs–Lone Oak Vineyard, Santa Lucia Highlands and Split Rock, Sonoma Coast.  The wines are developing fantastically with cherry and spice flavors coming through and nicely balanced on the  palette.  We also pulled a barrel sample of our ‘08 Las Brisas, Carneros, Pinot–it’s displaying nice cherry fruit flavors and a silky, velvety texture in the mouth.

Thanks to those who came, we had a great time.  And thank you to Maureen Sullivan for taking the photos!  Here is one review of the event.

Beresini Vineyard

We are very happy to announce the addition of Steve Beresini Carneros vineyard to our 2009 lineup.

Steve has a meticulously maintained small vineyard in Carneros that has been producing world class Pinot Noir and Chardonnay for many years by the likes of wineries such as MacRostie.  The vineyard was planted in 1989 making it one of the more mature Pinot vineyards around, even by Carneros standards.  Low yield and careful management of the vines produces superb wine. When Steve called to say he might have some fruit available for me I had to drive right over and see it. 

Stomping Girl will have three rows dedicated to us, two of the Pommard clone and one of the Calera clone. These 3 rows will give us only a tiny amount–maybe four barrels of wine.  And that is fine by us because we choose to produce small lots from grapes carefully grown by small family-owned vineyards.

Steve, who has been growing vines and making wine for more than thirty years, takes excellent care of his vineyard. He was the winemaker at one point at Niebaum-Coppola Winery and worked alongside the legendary André Tchelistchef, who consulted with Neibaum-Copola at the time.

While tasting his 2008 from the barrel, all Calera clone, we talked about his winemaking protocol. I tried to learn his winemaking secrets, what makes his wine so luscious and round, so aromatic and bright cherry red. He got a distant look on his face and reminisced about Andre, a mentor to him.  Then he said, “It’s really simple, it’s all starts in the vineyard, so when I walk around the vines and I’m suckering and pruning, I say to myself, ‘I am just walking around, making wine.’”

We are lucky to have this extra winemaker in the vineyard.